Please tell us a little about yourself and your work.

I’m an old-school goth and a big history geek, as well as a bookworm from the moment I could hold a book open. I write The Blood & Ancient Scrolls Series, a vampire series that goes cross-genre to include elements of horror, historical, and urban romantasy—basically, something for every reader and a fresh, unique exploration of the vampire myth.

How did you develop your characters?

The first main character of this series is Anushka “Noosh” Rosetti. While my other characters have generally taken more initial development, Noosh just started speaking with her voice right away, so her development as a character has been purely organic as she progresses on her growth journey through the world of the vampires.

When I was trying to find a narrator for the audiobooks, the most vital thing was to find someone who truly “got” Noosh, which I was so very lucky to do with Amber Benson. Amber completely brings Noosh alive: all the snark as emotional self-defense, and especially in the more vulnerable moments for the character.

The fascinating thing is that after the process of recording the first two books, as I got started working on the next and was writing Noosh’s dialogue, I heard Amber’s voice in my head! I know that the character will be all the stronger for now having taken on her own existence.

How did you research The Blood & Ancient Scrolls Series?

The real joy of writing vampires for me is that I get to go cross-genre into historical fiction as part of writing the story. From the reviews, the readers who love my series are here for this aspect of it.

My library of historical nonfiction is expanding rapidly, because I need to be able to leave page markers in the works as I research.

Yet again, doing the audiobooks with Amber has added an unexpected depth. Since I have so many characters from different parts of the world and born at different points in history, I worked closely with Amber to help her get the accent of each character just right. This meant gathering up my original research and discussing it with her, as well as paying native speakers of the various languages to record pronunciation guides for each character. It’s been a deeply geeky process, but it’s paid off with Amber being able to do incredible performances.

What are you working on now?

The third novel in the series, Blood Eternal, was just recorded by Amber—and I even went into the studio to read the title and acknowledgments myself! Also in progress is an audiobook of my most recent novelette in the series, That Lesbian Vampire Pirate Story, which was a surprise hit with a whole new readership this past summer. And while all those projects move through their publication stages, I’m halfway through with the next novel in the series, Blood Depths, which will have even more vampire pirates, as apparently everyone craves vampire pirates these days.

Portions of this Q&A were edited for clarity.